I've rarely been coupled on Valentine's Day. I have an uncanny ability to end up in the midst of a break-up, or arrive at some sort of ending, right before February 14th (this year being no exception). And yet, I can't help it--I still love the holiday.

My girlfriends and I have had an all girls Valentine's Day sleepover at my house the past five years, even those years we've been in relationships. The V-Day sleepover always involves mac & cheese, pink lollipops, Valentini cocktails, funfetti cupcakes, nail polish, copious amounts of Sex and the City, and silky jammies.

doing my nails at V-Day sleepover 2006

I think this was 2008--we even had heart-shaped ravioli!

part of last year's spread

It's totally a controversial holiday. Some people love getting super mushy with their lover, some couples think it's cheesy and commercial, some single people get bitter & boycott, and some single people--like me--embrace it as a day that celebrates LOVE!

Occasionally a little bit of self-pity begins to sink in, but then I remember how amazing my girlfriends are and how much fun the V-Day sleepover is every year. And it's kind of cute that my coffee table is turning into a Valentine factory:

Maruti Suzuki India Limited (MSIL) is one of the leading manufacturer in the auto market. Maruti Suzuki's cars are awesome. Well, one of the most expected cars of the year is Maruti Kizashi is all ready to rock in India on 2nd February 2011. The new wonder car Maruti Kizashi is going to enter in the market and give the flat competition for the selling saloon segment luxurious cars including Chevrolet Cruze, Volkswagen Jetta, Honda Accord etc. Maruti Kizashi is going to be the first D segment car of the company, however it's previous tip cars like Maruti SX4 and Swift Dzire fell in segment C. The beautiful car have the capacity of 2.4 L, petrol engine along with a 6 speed transmission gear box which is speculated to provide maximum power and torque around 185 bhp and 230 Nm.

The Maruti Kizashi has been seen amongst the most awaited cars of the year, reasons behind are its amazing outer look, the high technology used, comfortable and spacious interiors and strong build, and it is indeed an wise decision to pick this car in the sedan segment. The company has reveled that it is going to do some changes in the car distribution strategy in India. Recently, Maruti has introduced the car's properties in the posh areas of metros such as Delhi and Mumbai to capture the footfall of luxury cars buyers.

It has been speculated that the company has spent up to rs 50-60 crore to display properties in good areas like Indraprastha in Central Delhi and Lokhandwala in Mumbai's Andheri. The company is also planing to set a network by opening outlets in the metros of the Indian market. Marketing executive of Maruti Suzuki India, Mayank Pareek stated that there was a need to start a retail format that would help us in high-price sales.

The company spent a huge amount on real state in Mumbai. He added that they have somehow managed to get places in the right locations. Earlier, the company's presence was limited to the highly populated city areas with preference of mass-segment cars like Maruti Alto, Maruti Swift and Maruti Swift Dzire.

Check out this months Dazed & Confused to see the beautiful Ming Xi in a dreamy editorial created by Will Davidson and Joanna Schlenka. The ethereal styling and flowing movements create a poetic feature, celebrating innovative Asian fashion.

Bajaj is the brand name who gives the India a unique identification in the international automobile industry. The brand that gave India the slogan 'Hamara Bajaj’ is also the Bajaj. The brand that has always given the feeling of being own, loyal, local yet better than international is “Hamara Bajaj”. Now Bajaj is going to drop their family name. Removing the brand name is not an unusual event in Europe and other foreign countries but will certainly in India is the first in automobile industry.

Bajaj is the 2nd largest top bike manufacturing company in India. With a market cap of Rs. 37,800 crore the Bajaj is undergoing the most radical change after four years from the three ways splitting of the company. The leader of this mega transition is non other than the Bajaj Auto Managing Director Rajiv Bajaj. After just 3 months from now Hamara Bajaj could be Hamara discover. There are three version of Bajaj Discover and the entire version are successful to make enough market in the Indian automobile industry especially among the young generation. In a recent interview managing director of Bajaj, Mr. Rajiv Bajaj stated his interest in removing the Bajaj brand name from its product and its place, establish the discover and pulsar as the separate brand in its own light. According to him they also started the process of removing the brand name as we can see in the pulsar that Bajaj is used only in the engine chassis. If it is true then Indian automobile industry will see a new mega change in its history. The change might be done for Bajaj Pulsar as well.

It could not be forecasted that, will this change good for market and Bajaj or not. But according to the Bajaj himself, he doesn’t like this name (Bajaj) any more. Now all the Bajaj Discover version are launched under HAMARA Bajaj brand and not the Bajaj. The plan of Mr. Bajaj is to drop the name ‘Bajaj’ completely one day, and this change is seen the first step of that dream of Bajaj. As the Rajiv Bajaj (M.D. Bajaj) this change creates a perception that there is something new in the product.

This is the rebranding process of Bajaj. This is the new trend in Indian automobile industry, and it is suppose that after the Bajaj, other brand may get involve in this process how ever it is depend on the success rate of Bajaj’s rebranding process. Hope that the new trend in this industry will be successful.

Movil has launched two new bar phones in India this year, Movil Atom and Movil S10. Both have all the necessary features that today’s customer demands. The price is affordable and rather low when compared to the bar phones in the same segment by other companies. The dual sim supporting Movil atom only costs around 3500 rupees in India.

Movil Atom has a 2.0 inches TFT screen with QCIF display and screen resolution 176 x 220 pixels. The phone support 2G frequency of GSM 900/1800 MHz and has a half QWERTY key pad which enables an easy and fast typing. The dimensions of the phone are 97.9x108.6x13.2 mm. there is a 0.3 mega pixel camera with digital zoom and with an image resolution of 640x480 pixels. The internal memory of the phone is only 0.5 MB. But there is an expandable external memory which can support up to 2 GB using a micro SD card or a T-flash card. Movil Atom is powered by a 1000 mAh Li-ion battery which provides a talk time up to 3.5 hours and a stand by time of 200 hours. The phone has a WAP 2.0 browser for internet surfing and it has options that provide easy access to social networking sites such as Face Book, Ebuddy, Yahoo etc. Messaging facilities include SMS, MMS and instant messaging. Atom is available in black and red color in the market.

Movil S10 is also a similar dual sim supporting phone with a larger display screen and some more peculiar features. The screen is 2.2 inches TFT screen with 65k colors. There is a 1.3 mega pixel camera with digital zoom. The image resolution is 1280 x 1024 Pixels. The 2G operating frequency is GSM 900/1800 MHz.

The connectivity option are better than Atom with GPRS counter and blue tooth v.2. S10 has an Inbuilt Instant Windows Live Messenger for instant messaging and it also provide easy access to Face book, My Space, Hyves etc The internal memory id 0.5 MB and the external memory can be up to 8 GB with the support of micro SD card or T-flash card. The battery that powers Movil S10 is a standard Li-Ion 1000 mAh which provides a talk time up to 4 hours and a stand by time of 240 hours. The phone has an MP3 player, an MP4 player and an FM radio with recording facility. The dimensions of the phone are 110x47x10.5 mm. The phone book can store up to 500 entries with back up and the user can also black list any contact in case he needs any. The number of messages that can be stored in the phone is 200. The special features of the phone include melody composer mobile tracker, magic voice and image editor. Both Movil Atom and S10 are of simple design and do not contain any software.

Here comes the latest addition to the Sony Ericcson’s popular music phone series W205i. The launch of the Sony Ericsson W205i in India is expected to be in a few months in India. There are many rumors about the price. Most of them are around 3,000 to 5,000 Indian rupees.

Sony Ericsson W205i is Java MIDP 2.0 enabled and supports 2G network in the frequency range of dual band GSM 900/1800 MHz. There is 1.8 inches TFT screen with 65k colors. The screen resolution is 128x 160 pixels. The integrated camera with flash light is of 1.3 mega pixel. It has an image resolution of 1280x 1024 pixels. Video recorder is also present. The phone has GPRS and EDGE supporting the connectivity. GPRS is of Class 10 (4+1/3+2 slots) with a speed of 32 to 48 kbps and EDGE is of class 10 with a speed of 236.8 kbps. There is a WAP browser and HTML (Opera Mini) browser for fast and easy internet browsing.

Needless to say, the phone is equipped with the walkman media player with a TrackID music recognition which is the main attraction of the Sony Ericsson W205i. The phone supports MP3 and AAC music formats. There is a video player also. There is a stereo FM radio with RDS in the phone. It has an in built speaker. The internal memory available is rather small and 5MB in size. But there is an external Micro M2 card slot which can support up to 2GB. The phone book can store up to 1000 contacts and photo call facility is also present in the phone. The call log will store up to thirty dialed, received and missed calls. The phone is powered by a standard Lithium-Iron battery which will provide a talk time up to nine hours and a stand by time up to 425 hours. The music play can go continuously up to 13 hours and thirty minutes. The dimensions of the phone are 92.0 x 47.0 x 16.4 mm and it weighs around 96 Gms. There is global positioning system present in the phone. The messaging facilities include SMS, MMS and instant messaging.

The wireless connectivity is made possible through Bluetooth v.2 and there is USB 2.0 port in the Sony Ericsson W205i. In built games are present in the phone and the facility to download more games from the internet is also there. W205i supports polyphonic, MP3 and AAC ring tones and also has internal vibration alert. Then the additional features of the phone include organizer, memo etc. The phone is available in ambient black color in the market.

I know videos can be tedious to watch. I often start watching a video someone's posted on facebook or a blog, and then skip to the next thing after about 30 seconds (my attention span is that of a flea's).

But as a person who teaches kids of incarcerated parents, I find this video so moving. It made me get teary toward the end and my legs got goosebumps! Most of my students are all too familiar with what this guy is saying in his brilliant & haunting poem.

Not to be preachy, but there are 2.4 million children in this country with a parent who is incarcerated. If we don't intervene/step up/embrace them, it's all too clear that they're gonna slip through the cracks.

Zen is the new mobile manufacturing company and it has released a latest products with the amazing feature of triple SIM. This mobile phone is known as the Zen M111 in the telecom market. This is the first mobile phone in the telecom market of India, which has the configuration to use the three SIM at the same time. This mobile phone has the attractive look and its shape is like a candy bar. The Zen M111 is a lovely phone and it is available in the market in very reasonable price. The cost price of this mobile phone is only Rupees 3499 in the telecom market of India.

The Zen M111 has so many interesting features and also the attractive look. The Zen M111 has the special features of triple SIM. It supports the GSM/GSM and GSM with the multiple bands of frequency. The new Zen M111 has a good display screen of 2.4 inches with the good screen resolutions. This mobile phone has the standard and durable battery of long backup. This mobile phone can support the two different types of languages like Hindi and English. This mobile phone has the complete solution for multimedia. The new Zen M111 has an improved camera of 1.3 Megapixel with the features of video recording. The powerful camera of this mobile phone has the advanced option of digital 4X Zoom. You can able to capture beautiful images and videos of your own selection through this advanced camera.

There are so many additional features are available in this mobile phones. This mobile phone has the large space for storing the contacts, messages, important Notes, songs, games and many more things. The memory expandability of this mobile phone is up to 8 GB with the Micro SD Memory Card Slot. The Zen M111 has an advanced music player, which can support the various music files and video files. There are six equalizer bands are also available in this mobile phone through which, you will get the better music of the songs as per your selection. This mobile phone has some additional features like sound recorder, FM Radio and many more. The shape of this mobile phone is like a candy bar and also you will get the two back panels of several colours like red and white. This mobile phone has a standard battery of 1500mah, which will provide the long battery backup of standby around 275 hours and the talk time is up to 6 hours.

Lemon is a latest mobile manufacturing company, who has introduced its two latest model are named as Lemon Duo 302 and Lemon Duo 305. These two latest handsets are very good looking, stylish and made with the amazing colours. The special thing about these two mobile phones is dual SIM. These two phones are configured in such a way that can support the both GSM and GSM SIM card at the same time. The new Lemon Duo 302 and 305 have so many advanced and amazing features. These two mobile phones are very easy to operate and anyone can able to use it very easily. The Lemon mobile phone manufacturing has not still declared the price for these two latest model phones in the telecom market of India.

The Lemon Duo 302 has the attractive look and also has amazing features for music. This mobile phone does not support the internet, but it has specially configured for the music with the long battery backup. This mobile phone supports the double SIM for GSM and GSM of 900 and 1800 MHz band. It has a TFT display screen of 1.8 inches with the high resolutions features. This mobile phone has an advanced music player which can support the various file formats like 3GP and MP4 in Video files and as well the various MP3 files. It can also play the FM radio. It has also the additional features of auto call records and Loudspeakers for better music. There are so many special features are available in this mobile phone like LED Torch light, Long Battery life, amazing games, Mobile Tracker, Support for the Hindi language and many more. The memory of this mobile phone can be expanded up to 8 GB with the Micro SD slot.

The New Lemon duo 305 is another latest model of Lemon Mobile Manufacturing Company. This mobile phone is enabled with the more advanced feature comparison of Lemon Duo 302. There are so many features are available in this mobile phone which are equal to Lemon Duo 302 like Dual SIM option of GSM and GSM of 900/1800MHz band, 1.8 inches TFT display screen with the High Resolution feature, Mobile Tracker, LED Torch Light, advanced music player with the support of 3GP and MP4 files in Video and several MP3 files, FM Radio, Auto Call Record, Loud Speakers for better music, long battery life, memory expandability up to 8GB and many more. There are so many special features are available in this mobile phone, which makes it better than Lemon Duo 302 like Bluetooth and Camera with the configuration of 1.3MP.

The Nachus Electronics is a Chennai based south-Indian company has introduced a new brand in telecom sector i.e. I4. Nachus Electronics is a financially strong company which gives a turnover of about 100 crores. The company works as stockist of many companies and deals in cables, home appliances, and now manufacturing mobile phones on large scale. The new I4 phones are I4 NA 55, I4 NA 33V, I4 N6, I4 NA 33, I4 Black Pearl, I4 NA 350, I4 NA 320, I4 NA 120 and I4 Thunder.

The I4 phone is especially designed for the youngsters having classy looks. It’s a dual SIM phone. The phone will be available in single royal black color. The phone has advance technical features which gives more facilities than a normal phone and will soon hit the market. The phone is equipped with 3.2 inch touch screen. The price of the phone is not officially declared.

I4 phone is equipped with 3.0 mega pixel camera with digital zooming that can capture high definition pictures. It also has internal storage capacity of 1 GB which can be expandable upto 8GB with micro SD card slot and featured with T-Flash technology. The phone is featured with large phone book in which (max) 2000 contacts can be stored easily. The phone supports multiple languages namely, English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Persian, German, Turkish, Malay, Indonesian, Russian, Arabic, Vietnamese etc.

When it comes to entertainment the I4 mobile proves to be very entertaining phone as it is equipped with MP3 Player with an audio jack. The stylish phone has also featured with RDS stereo FM radio with mind blowing sound quality. The phone has inbuilt Wi- Fi and also supports Java and TV which helps in excellent internet browsing. The phone is GPRS and EDGE enabled that helps in fast connectivity. The elegant phone also has many inbuilt features like Gravity sensor, calendar, calculator, recorder, world clock, alarm clock etc.

The phone is little bit bulky with thick body which weighs 103 grams having dimensions of 115 mm X 59 mm X 10 mm but can be carried easily. The phone is featured with long lasting Li- ion standard battery of 1800 mAh that delivers an efficient talk time. To connect the phone with computer it also equipped with Bluetooth and USB with WAP and opera mini browser. Ovi Store, music & life tools, chat, Facebook, vast library of tunes, flicker and many more are preinstalled features that can be accessible in a single click. The stylish brand manufacturer I4 will entertain its users with all the advance features. The price range of the mobiles is Rs 2,500 to Rs 4,000 that includes I4 NA 33V, I4 Thunder, I4 NA 55, I4 NA 350, I4 N6, I4 Black Pearl, I4 NA 33, I4 NA 320 and I4 NA 120.

Ford is one of the leafing car manufacturer in auto Industry . Ford India and its famous small car Figo, together left behind the 29 Indian auto industry in 2010, by winning the Best passenger car in the country. The company is an American multinational automaker based in Dearborn. Ford introduced various methods for large scale management of an workforce using assembly lines. Frod has been awarded by the three 'Cars of the Year' titles with the prestigious mark of 'Manufacturer of the Year', with the complete broadcast and print media house. It has been proved as the popular compact car by honoured by the 'Indian Car of the Year 2011' award- which is the most revered auto industry award in India.

Around 60'000 Ford Figo have been sold since March and India have an impressive increment in the annual sales by 184 percent as compared to 2009.Figo has the hold in its segment and won all the needful trophies to became the best car. These prestigious honour have came across to the general public through print, broadcast and Internet mediums. They have created the awareness against the superb brand building, recognition and acknowledgement of the Ford Figo's features including the amazing design, high class technology, fuel efficient powerstrains and the value for money package these all are meant to fulfill the customers needs and enhance their lifestyle.

The managing director and president of Ford, Michael Boneham conveyed that the Ford Figo was their change for the Indian market and it has been performed exeptionally well, it is really appericiating that the peole had a wide choice in the market but still they liked Figo. He added that because of Ford Figo's customers they have won the honourable award.

The car rulls in thousand of customers, 40% of them were the people who buy the cars for the first time, they shown the unbelievable trust on the newcomer car. Figo also seeks tremendous support from the social sites as well. Various popular websites and blogs organised their independent polls and visitors voted the car as 'Car of the Year'. Ford also gained the popularity with the Ford Fiesta, Ford Ikon and the Ford Endeavour performing well in their respective segments in the year of 2010.

Samsung launched its new smart phone Samsung Star GT-S5260 aka Samsung star II, the successor of Samsung GT-S5230 Star which has been a super success in market and sold over 30 million all over the world. The new phone comes with everything that the old Samsung Star lacked. The phone offers a superior social networking experience which keeps you connected with your family and friends. The personalized user interface ensures an easy and comfortable usage of phone.

The Samsung star II comes with a 3.0 inch TFT WQVGA capacitive touch screen with 256k colors and Samsung’s special Touch Wiz 3.0 user interface. The display resolution is 240 * 400 pixels. There is a remarkable Quick Type T9 Trace keyboard that makes it easy to text messages or chat with friends. The phone has the ability to determine the word the user may want to type from the movement of his fingers over the keyword. And star II has the feature that the old Samsung star lacks. The Wi-Fi 802.11 b/g/n is for wireless connectivity. The improved and sophisticated Samsung hardware provides the integration of social networking sites such as Facebook, Twitter etc. The phone also comes equipped with multi- IM 2.0 which provides access to the user’s accounts in IM services like Yahoo, Google Talk, AIM, and MSN etc .The phone has a 3.5 mm audio port.

The Samsung star II has a 3.2 mega pixel camera with digital zoom with an image resolution of 2048×1536 pixels. QVGA video recording at 15 fps is also possible. It supports 2G network with frequencies of operation in GSM 850/900/1800/1900 MHz. The phone has an internal memory of 30 MB and can support up to 16 GB external memory through the micro SD card slot. The dimensions of the phone are 107.5 x 54 x 12.4 mm and have a weight of 90 gram. Internet access is made easy through WAP browser, xHTML browser and HTML browser. The music player allows both MP3 and MP4 formats. A stereo FM radio with RDS is present. Bluetooth V2.1 with A2DP is present for connectivity. Messaging facility include SMS, MMS, IM and e-mails. The phone book can store a reasonable number of contacts and photo call option is also provided. It supports MP3 and WAV ring tones. There are monthly pay deals available for this phone from Orange and Vodafone. The user get additional benefits like talk time, 12 months of free rental, mobile insurance etc along with free gifts like lap tops, camera, iPods, etc.

Micromax is going to launch a new model which named is Micromax Q1 Plus. It has an attractive body structure which grabs the peoples. It comes with beautiful black color which people like most.

Micromax Q1 Plus has a feature of dual sim and a display of 2.2 inch, TFT 262K colors and display size is 176 x 220 pixels. Micromax Q1 plus has the digital zoom. Its camera resolution is 640 x 480 pixels. It has 5 way navigation key and also has good video recording capabilities. Micromax Q1 plus is multimedia mobile phone because it comes with glossy QWERTY keypad. It also supports various music formats such as MP3, AMR, MIDI, and WAV with background music and it also supports games. Micromax Q1 Plus has a feature of Bluetooth, GPRS and also have a frequency band of GSM 900/1800 MHz| GSM 900/1800 MHz. The size of Micromax Q1 Plus is 111.2 x 61.2 x 13 MM and the weight of this phone is 97 grams.

It supports WAP 2.0/xHTML web browser and also have a feature of stereo FM. Micromax Q1 Plus supports SMS storage capacity up to 300 and 1000 phonebook entries including dialled calls, missed calls, and received calls. Micromax Q1 Plus has a good storage capability. Its storage capacity is up to 2GB with microSD card. Micromax Q1 Plus comes with the feature of 1000 MAH battery, the talktime of standard battery is up to 3 hours and standby time is up to 120 hours. The price of Micromax Q1 Plus in India is Rs. 1659/-.

You can get a lot of functions in this handset, with the stylish accessories like leather pouches which can save your mobile from, the outer damages like save screen from scratches and save screen, keypad from dust particles. It also provides the USB cable for connecting it into PC. You can get Transceiver, Charger, Battery, Handsfree kit, Service Guide, User guide and Warranty card with Micromax Q1 Plus.

The main grabing point of the mobile Micromax Q1 Plus is its price which is affordable. If you want to get best feature in a low price then buy Micromax Q1 Plus. This phone gives you the best opportunity to avail less price with maximum features. It is the most profitable purchases.

3. One of my besties had her baby!!! Perhaps you know who I'm referring to. :) I'll give you more deets as soon as she gives me the okay, but let's just say I can't wait to meet my lil nephew!

4. Scoutmob

If you live in San Francisco, Atlanta, or New York City and you don't have Scoutmob, get with the program. Every other day or so you get a 50% off coupon (on your phone) to a restaurant/store/etc. around town. Last Friday night I had dinner with some of my faves at Andalu for half off (three of us had dinner & a pitcher of sangria for $30-something!). Sweeeeeeet.

World's one the top car manufacturer, Toyota is all ready to bring the revolutionary change in the domestic Indian auto market. Maruti Suzuki's and it's Swift Desire were ruling till now but it time go get something different and excellent Toyota Etios, which is entering in the saloon segment soon. The segment has been facing the outstanding growth in recent times and looking at the same. Toyota, a Japanese car maker has launched the beautiful sedan Toyota Etios for the Indian Auto market which proved the company's success by making over 21000 bookings in a short period of one and a half month of its introduction. This depicts the unexpected entry of the car.

This has been speculated that the delivery of Toyota Etios have been started from Jan. 2011 have a long waiting period of around 7 months. If talk about Maruti Swift Dzire it has the waiting period 2-3 months which almost every car takes and the cars of Maruti have faced a drop of 1,000 units in last year. However Tat Indio also faced a drop in demand by 5,234 units in December at the lowest figure of last year.

As the reports says the monthly sales of Maruti Suzuki's Dzire is nearly around 9,000 to 9,500 units and 1,800-2,300 units of Maruti SX4. However, in the month of December it led to a fall by 9,362 units against the 11,115 units. The company reveled that the fall because of the production constraints and all products produced by the company are sold and company is still in the waiting period of 2-3 months.

As it is already being known that Toyota is the best for manufacturing sedan segments cars and with the entry in new segment, the demand for it's new product is increasing at a good pace. This segment is heating up with the launch of Toyota Etios. This car is made exclusive for the Indian customers in the domestic market. The company is expected to give the direct competition to companies like Mahindra Logan, Hyundai Accent, Tata Indigo and Maruti Swift Dzire.

Ever wondered what goes on behind the scenes of the world’s most glamorous catwalk shows? As much as we would love to reveal a scandalous world of tantrums and catfights the reality is far less exciting, especially for the models. Check out these shots of Elite girls behind the scenes at the couture shows...backstage must haves include: ipod, phone, snack, book and a cup of tea!